Managers of commercial establishments, such as retail stores, shopping malls, transportation centers and the like, responsible for maximizing sales of products and services, are well aware that the layout of their facilities has a substantial impact on sales volume. To evaluate this impact, it is necessary to gather data characterizing the flow of customer traffic into and within the facility. This data will reveal the locations where customers are present more frequently (“hot spots”) and those where customer traffic is lighter (“cold spots”).
With this information, it is possible for the manager to make changes in features that affect accessibility, lighting, fixture space, product placement, and the like that will improve product exposure and reduce the number and/or size of cold spots. After such changes have been made, the manager will often wish to conduct a further traffic flow study to assess the effectiveness of these changes.
The tracking data, along with product placement data are also important to distributors of products sold in commercial establishments. This information enables them to evaluate whether their products are receiving sufficient attention in a retail store, so that the cost of shelf space is justified. It also enables them to assess whether they should request shelf space for their products in a different location in the store.
Traditionally such traffic flow studies have been conducted manually. One or more of the manager's employees would record the movements of customers within the facility on a sheet representing its layout. The accumulated data would then be reviewed by the manager. Clearly, this is a labor-intensive way of gathering such data. It is also potentially annoying to customers if the employees tracking them are not very discrete.
It is desired, therefore, to provide a less expensive and less potentially annoying way to gather such traffic flow data. In addition, both managers of commercial establishments as well as manufacturers and distributors would like to obtain reports from which they can evaluate the effectiveness of their advertising expenditures, based not only on such traffic flow data but also on media exposure data and the like.